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The Directors Guild has announced nominees for outstanding directing in a film for 2018, along with its annual first-time director noms. This year’s list includes a double mention for Bradley Cooper, who made his directorial debut with Warner Bros’ musical drama A Star Is Born, and Spike Lee, who gets his first DGA nom ever for Focus Features’ BlacKkKlansman. That may be a shocking statistic about Lee, but he has also never been nominated for the directing Oscar either. This year reps his best chance to break that curse.

The list, which also includes Alfonso Cuarón for Roma, Peter Farrelly for Green Book and Adam McKay for Vice, does not contain huge surprises but it is especially important as the guild has been a savvy prognosticator on who will be the eventual Oscar winner — in fact it has differed only seven times since the DGA started giving awards in 1949. Interestingly...

In a year when the Oscar race is packed with popular films with flaws of one sort or another, the Directors Guild of America awards nominations provide a significant signpost of where things are headed. Golden Globe-winner “Bohemian Rhapsody” may be showing strong Guild support, but the DGA, which dictated that Bryan Singer get director credit for the film he left under fire (completed by Dexter Fletcher), did not go there.

The 2018 DGA nominations went to five lead contenders for the directing Oscar: Alfonso Cuaron for “Roma,” his second nomination after DGA-winner “Gravity,” Bradley Cooper for “A Star is Born,” Peter Farrelly for “Green Book,” Spike Lee for “BlacKkKlansman,” and Adam McKay for “Vice.” McKay was also nominated for “The Big Short.”

Cooper also landed a second nomination for first-time director. This marks Lee’s first DGA nomination; he is the fourth African-American director to be nominated for Best Feature by the DGA,...

The drama Out of the Furnace seems like a hot commodity right now. It sports a stellar cast that includes Christian Bale and Casey Affleck in the lead roles, and Zoe Saldana, Willem Dafoe and Woody Harrelson in the supporting cast, as well as backing from celebrity production companies like Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way and Ridely Scott’s Scott Free. The film is currently being shot in western Pa, and on Sunday, executive producer Jeff Waxman, producer/production coordinator Julie Hartley, and various crew members spoke at a Pa Film Industry Association meeting in Pittsburgh, giving some insight to the project. We were there and one can see details below.

During the talk, Waxman repeatedly compared the film to The Fighter, which also featured Bale in an Oscar-winning performance. In past reports, Furnace was said to have a “No Country For Old Men vibe,” so this new development changes some expectations.